


Select Few

by goldfishtobleroneandamitie



Category: Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Enjolras dresses badly, Fic Exchange, Gen, and out of date, friendship fic!, or rather how they became friends
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-21
Updated: 2013-12-21
Packaged: 2018-01-05 10:47:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,090
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1092981
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goldfishtobleroneandamitie/pseuds/goldfishtobleroneandamitie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Or, how Enjolras's fashion choices alternately confuse and distract Courfeyrac outside a patisserie.</p>
<p>For ellevante's prompt, 'femmejolras'.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Select Few

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Ellevante (Organelle)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Organelle/gifts).



Upon meeting Enjolras, Courfeyrac’s first thought had been _why on Earth is such a lovely lady in a waistcoat?_

He had hastily chastised himself, shaking his head a touch (with a hand to his carefully-angled hat) and sternly informing himself that _the lady may wear whatever the lady pleases._

The lady in question appeared to be gesturing rather violently at a mildly-cowed shopkeeper. Despite his frightened look, however, the man appeared firm, continuing to shake his head at the increasing ferocity of the bewaistcoated woman’s movements.

“I apologize, monsieur, but Inspector Javert is a highly prized patron of my shop. I could not be seen disseminating such, ah, _inflammatory_ literature,” the man says in stilted French, with a clear but not obstructive English accent.

“Not inflammatory, sir—rather, enlightening,” a taller man replied, laying a hand on the sputtering girl’s arm. “Surely even officers of the law require occasional stimulation?”

“Clearly, you have never met the Inspector.” The shopkeeper frowns. “I am sorry, sir, but I will ask you to remove your companion until he has composed himself. It is unseemly.”

“ _I’ll_ show you unseemly, you—”

“ _Enjolras.”_

The shopkeeper sniffs and with a stiff ‘good day, m’sieurs,” re-enters his shop with a gait that in a man not the approximate size and shape of a stork could be called stomping.

“Combeferre, the man’s a complete—“

“Yes, I realize that,” the bespectacled, taller man replies, as the pair turns towards the still-confused Courfeyrac, “but shouting at him will do us and the cause no good. Let us head back; Feuilly is waiting for us at the Corinthe.”

“Ah, yes, Feuilly! _He_ will understand, and perhaps Bahorel can find more places for us to distribute our literature.” The lady turns all the way around, aggressively tugging on the coat previously over her arm, and is nearly past Courfeyrac before her face becomes clear.

Courfeyrac is on the verge of spitting out words he’s learned in the gutters of the city before seeing the pretty girl selling flowers less than five feet away. _She,_ at least, actually is a lady, because the small, angry creature at Combeferre’s elbow is no more a lady than Courfeyrac himself is.

(His personal opinions on the thought of wearing petticoats notwithstanding).

The man— _Enjolras,_ he thinks it is—is, however, prettier than the large majority of women Courfeyrac has ever met. His hair is long and lush, pulled into a queue that’s quite long and hopelessly out of style. He is hatless, an _erreur de mode_ as egregious as Courfeyrac (a self-admitted clotheshorse) can imagine. His clothing is well-made but at least five years out of date—he appears to be nearly wearing a girdle, his waist is so narrow, and his hips flare out as a slender woman’s would. The illusion isn’t helped by the flared cut of his (flapping open, the Philistine) double-breasted coat, nor by the scarlet waistcoat beneath, delicately stitched with blue thread. His cravat is hopelessly lopsided, and Courfeyrac’s fingers itch to fix it because _truly_ does a man’s cravat not define him? No _wonder_ the shopkeeper was unimpressed, however admirable the cause may be.

By far, however, the illusion is carried by the man’s face. For now, his look has relaxed from stormy to merely petulant, pushing lips red and full out like a bow. They are in sharp contrast to his pale skin—nearly translucent, the kind that women Courfeyrac knows personally would kill for. The porcelain tone is touched only with rose at his cheeks, darker, Courfeyrac imagines, than usual due to his recent ire. His brow is high, but his eyebrows low and narrow above his eyes, rendering him permanently disdainful.

All in all, the man is far more beautiful than anyone, man or woman, has a right to be.

“Nevertheless, the—”

Courfeyrac is not able to move in time, and so the still-pontificating godling knocks him nearly into the pretty flower seller he’d been eyeing earlier. He extricates himself from daisies and heliotrope with a wicked grin at the girl, who blushes and, instead of chastising, merely flaps her hands at him. With a parting wink, re-adjusting his hat, Courfeyrac turns. “My sincerest apologies, monsieur. I must not have moved aside quickly enough.”

“Surely, sir,” the beautiful man’s companion replies, “It was”—he glances at the still-muttering princeling—“our fault. Our pardon.”

“Let us merely agree on no blame, then,” Courfeyrac says cheerfully. “May I ask the name of men so passionate that they may alienate the best pâtissier in this part of Paris?”

“I am Émile Combeferre,” the bespectacled man says, “intern at Necker.” He glances ruefully at the blond man. “And this inconsiderate one is Andrѐ Enjolras, lately of the law school at the École Normale Supérieure.”

“A Napoleonic institution,” Enjolras sniffs. “I would learn the law as it should be, not as it is.”

“A most honorable profession,” Courfeyrac laughs, “if somewhat less practical. I am, myself, at the law school. I prefer to think of the law as something to know, if only to know exactly what needs to be burned.”

Enjolras starts, peering out from under his disdainful brows. “You said your name was…”

“I did not! How gauche of me. Jacques Marcelin de Courfeyrac, at your service,” Courfeyrac smiles, sweeping off his hat with an affected bow. “My friends—”

“ _de_ Courfeyrac? Are you a member of the old bourgeoisie, then?” The eyebrows have come back down, and if possible, the red lips are firmed with disinterest.

“—as I would have said,” replies Courfeyrac patiently, “I am known to my friends as Courfeyrac. I would shed the _de_ more easily if I was not dependent on my father for my living.”

With a less-than-subtle nudge from Combeferre, Enjolras lets out a chastised “my apologies”.

“I am difficult to offend, _mon ami_ ,” Courfeyrac says politely, “especially from someone with such obvious passion. I would, if you are amenable, discuss the changes you would make to the law?”

“We are to meet a good friend, a workingman, at a café in the eleventh _arrondissemont._ He, too, shares our ideals,” Combeferre interjects. “We would be honored if you would join us.”

“As honored as I am to be invited? I think not. I will take you up on it, friend! However—” Courfeyrac pauses. “If I may?”

At Enjolras’s puzzled nod, Courfeyrac seizes the ends of his now-loose cravat.

“I would find it very difficult to discuss the law with such a distraction,” he says cheerfully as he tucks it into a neat, if simple, bow.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I was bemused by the tumblr post "friendship is weird, we just pick people and go 'yes I like these ones'," hence the title. This was harder than I thought it would be! Writing gen that's focused on pretty a character is something I could only get out of Courfeyrac. 
> 
> It doesn't matter for this, but Easter egg: Courfeyrac is both bisexual and somewhat genderqueer here (he male-presents, obviously, because it's more convenient, but he is intrigued by dresses). 
> 
> Thank you for reading, and happy holidays!
> 
> -gfaa


End file.
